Date Published:
February 2005

L’Encyclopédie de l’histoire du Québec / The Quebec History Encyclopedia

James Douglas

(1837-1918)

Douglas, James (1837-1918), chancellor of Queen's University, Kingston (1915-18), was born at Quebec , Lower Canada, in 1837, the son of James Douglas, M.D. He was educated at Edinburgh University and at Queen's University, Kingston, Canada (B.A., 1858), and was ordained a minister of the Presbyterian church. He retired from the ministry, after a brief experience, and became professor of chemistry in Morrin College, Quebec ; and in 1869 he was elected president of the Quebec Literary and Historical Society. In 1875 he went to the United States as manager of a copper works at Phoenixville, Pennsylvania ; and he became an outstanding authority in, mining and metallurgy. He was twice president of the Institute of Mining Engineers, and in 1900 he represented the United States at the Mining Congress in Paris, France. He was a benefactor of Queen's University, Kingston ; and in 1915 he was elected its chancellor. He died at New York on June 25, 1918. In 1860 he married Naomi, third daughter of Walter Douglas, of Glasgow , Scotland. He was the author of a number of papers contributed, before 1875, to the Canadian Monthly, and, among other works, of a Memoir of T. Sterry Hunt (Philadelphia, 1898), Untechnical addresses on technical subjects (New York, 1905), Old France in the New World (Cleveland, 1905), and New England and New France (New York, 1913). He also edited his father's journals and reminiscences. (New York, 1910).

Source: W. Stewart WALLACE, ed., The Encyclopedia of Canada, Vol. II, Toronto, University Associates of Canada, 1948, 411p., pp. 230-231.